NEW HOUSING HOT; CONSTRUCTION THROUGHOUT VALLEY HITS FASTEST PACE IN PAST 10 YEARS.

Byline: Gregory J. Wilcox Daily News Staff Writer

With their three children in tow, Frank Santamaria and his wife, Silvia, spent a recent Sunday afternoon browsing through model homes, marveling at the spacious kitchens and big yards. It's become a familiar ritual.

The Canyon Country residents have been house-shopping for three months and were revisiting a new Kaufman & Broad track along Fenton Street north of the Foothill Freeway in Sylmar that they had checked out several times before.

They know that the market is tight, which means sellers hold the upper hand when it comes to negotiating price. But the Santamarias are determined to make their next house a new one, even if it means leaving the comfortable confines of the Santa Clarita Valley for the San Fernando Valley.

It's a simple case of math and money management as the family tries to make its $230,000 go as far as it can.

``You can get more house here than you can get there,'' said Frank Santamaria, a salesman at Galpin Ford. ``The area makes a difference, but we want to get a nice house.''

While the San Fernando Valley's resale housing market is in the midst of a boom, the new home building market also is gathering steam. From Tujunga in the Northeast Valley to Porter Ranch and Tarzana, building pads are being graded and new homes are springing up at a pace not seen in a decade.

This new product spans the entire price range, from homes considered affordable - the high $100,000 range - to palatial estates with seven-figure price tags. And while it can't be classified as a boom, the gain is significant when compared to the recent past.

New home building in the Valley is now running 30 percent ahead of what was taking place several years ago, said John Kennedy, the Los Angeles City Planning Department tract supervisor for the Valley.

New home construction is a cyclical business, and there have been gains of this magnitude before. But the current one is the biggest since the late 1980s.

Since the economy remains strong, this resurgence has some legs under it, but geography dictates that it cannot last forever.

``There is a big demand as long as the economy and interest rates stay the way they are, so I can foresee this lasting for months if not years. But at some point we are going to run out of dirt, at least for large developments, anyway,'' Kennedy said.

He notes there is a big demand for new homes that can put their owners closer to jobs in the Valley.

``Some of these are sold out as they are coming out of the ground. There is a certain urgency at the time of final inspection on these houses because people are waiting to get in,'' Kennedy said.

Traditionally, the north and west ends of the Valley have been hot spots for new construction. But in this latest burst, the activity has moved east into Sylmar and Tujunga.

Kennedy estimated that about 770 homes are under construction at various sites across the Valley, including smaller tracts of just a handful of homes in existing neighborhoods on the Valley floor.

And there are some big projects under way, too.

As Hubbard Street winds its way into the low foothills of the Angeles National Forest, the demarcation line between urban sprawl and wilderness, Wilshire Builders of Santa Monica is hammering, sawing and grading away on what will become a 467-home development, Daybreak at Mountain Glen. Nature will be the neighbor next door.

Prices start in the $190,000 range and top out at about $240,000 at what will eventually become a private, gated community with a common pool and recreation area.

The company broke ground last July on the first phase of 150 homes, and business has been brisk. So far, 29 homes have been sold on a pre-build basis, or more than 20 percent of the first phase allocation.

``It's well above our expectations,'' Howard Press, the company's vice president, said of interest in the new development.

The lots average about 4,000 square feet and, as in the case with other new home developments, buyers will pay more for bigger lots and better views. Down payment requirements can be tailored to meet the needs of individual buyers, he said.

The project has been in the works for ``well over 10 years,'' and the economic factors have finally fallen into place for development to proceed.

``What we're seeing today is a lot of appreciation for new homes. We're seeing demand outstrip supply. And our prices are very competitive for what's going on in the rest of the San Fernando Valley,'' Press said.

Most of the traffic is from first-time buyers or families that own a home and simply want to move into a new one, he said.

A few miles away, Kaufman & Broad is building a 75-unit project just north of the Foothill Freeway. None of the homes, which range in price from about $190,000 to the mid-$200,000 range, have been completed, but 22 have been sold. Leon Swails, president of the company's greater Los Angeles operations, said the current sales rate is about two homes per week.

``We are really pleased with that. It's a really brisk pace for us. We could very easily be out of there by the first week of next year,'' he said.

Kaufman & Broad buys land that has already been approved for new housing developments and is currently looking for more sites throughout the Valley. The company declined to provide specific locations.

But if company officials can find the land and build the houses, they won't have any trouble selling the product as long as the economy stays strong.

Demand is such that builders haven't advertised extensively and can rely on word-of-mouth or passers-by.

``Most of the people that are buying here are from Sylmar or San Fernando, so I don't have to go into a spiel about the neighborhood because they already know about it,'' said Kaufman & Broad sales representative Ronald Hawkins.

Some families, like the Santamarias, are so keen on buying a new home that they are willing to put up with several months of inconvenience. The family has already sold its home in Canyon Country and is prepared to live in an apartment while they decide which property to buy and then wait for it to be finished.

They have already put down a deposit on a home at Mountain Glen but are now leaning toward one of the Kaufman & Broad models because the lots are bigger.

They also checked out about 30 properties in the Santa Clarita resale market but could not find any deals. ``I like the area in Santa Clarita, but the homes are very expensive. It's a sellers market and they don't want to negotiate,'' Silvia Santamaria said.

And buying a new home today, even one in a tract with existing homes nearby,

is almost like getting a custom home.

Buyers can select a variety of floor plans and options like spa tubs, balconies and kitchen islands. Some even come with three car garages.

First-time buyers Lamar Shamburger, a computer analyst, and Doria Braggs are planning a June 12 wedding and getting ready to buy their first home.

The houses they have seen in Sylmar look like nice places to start their life together, agreed Shamburger and Braggs, who have set a budget of $180,000.

They too, are determined to make their first purchase a new home.

``We're moving into a house for the first time, and we can do what we want with it,'' said Braggs, a Lake View Terrace resident.

Added Shamburger, ``We're still looking, but we've seen things we like so we'll probably put an offer in soon.''

Further to the West in Granada Hills, Porter Ranch Development Co./S&S Construction Co. is getting ready to start on two projects totaling 255 homes that will be pricier that those in Sylmar.

The 55-home Villagio project opened for preview last weekend, and homes go on sale this weekend. Prices are in the $400,000 to mid-$500,000 range. Later this summer, the 200-home Renaissance development goes on line. Those prices have not been set yet, said Randy Tasch, the company's sales manager for the Valley.

Porter Ranch Development still has more than 1,000 acres it can develop, the biggest single chunk of entitled property left in the Valley. The company has been building homes in the Valley since the mid-1980s, and the prices of their new homes have climbed between 15 and 20 percent over the last 10 years, Tasch said.

He, too, expects that the homes built this summer will be sold before they are finished.

And Tasch agreed that this is the biggest surge in new home development since the 1980s. But it is nothing like what was happening back then.

``Eighty-eight and '89 were uncomparable. They (buyers) were lining up 1,000 deep. I don't know if we'll ever see that again, but now the demand for new housing out there is tremendous,'' he said.

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos

PHOTO (1--Color) First-time home buyers Lamar Shamburger and Doria Braggs, who are planning a June 12 wedding, look at homes in the Sylmar area.

(2--Color) Frank and Silvia Santamaria, along with their children, pause in the kitchen of a model home in Sylmar while shopping for a new house.

Gene Blevins/Special to the Daily News